A corpus of French texts with non-standard orthography

Text of a paper presented in 2006 at the Workshop on Corpus Linguistics - Research Domain, at the Tokyo University of Foreign Studies, 14-15 Septembre 2006. The written verstion was published in 2007 in: Corpus-Based Perspectives in Linguistics, ed. par Yuji Kawaguchi, Toshihiro Takagaki, Nobuo Tomimori et Yoichiro Tsuruga, pp. 191–215. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, and in: Linguistic Informatics and Corpus Linguistics, ed. by Yuji Kawaguchi, Toshihiro Takagaki, Nobuo Tomimori and Yoichiro Tsuruga, pp. 165–189. Tokyo : 21st Century COE: Center of Usage Based Linguistic Informatics (Linguistic Informatics VII).

A corpus of French texts with non-standard orthography

Yves Charles Morin Université de Montréal The phonetic reconstruction of earlier stages of languages essentially relies on four techniques, unequally applicable to various languages: (1) comparative reconstruction, (2) internal reconstruction, (3) phonetic interpretation of early graphic systems, and (4) phonetic interpretation of poetic conventions such as rhymes and meter during its history. These techniques all have limitations and the best results are obtained when these can be combined and completed with one another, as is often possible with French. Graphic systems may sometimes be relatively phonetic, i.e. may give more or less reliable indications of the pronunciation of a language, usually for relatively formal registers. It is rarely the case, however, that such phonetic correspondence remains stable in the course of time. Graphic systems are notoriously conservative and tend to be retained after sound changes have disrupted the phonographic correspondences that might have existed at earlier stages. Non-standard orthographies — whether they are intentionally devised as substitutes for current conventional spelling systems or elaborated by semi-literate scriptors after they acquired some rudiments of conventional orthography — tend to follow some kind of phonographic principle (not necessarily based on some prior phonemic awareness, as is sometimes claimed, however). Early documents using such orthographies thus offer a glimpse of the sound patterns of a language at the time when they were written, and have constituted some of the most important evidence used in scholarly works on the history of French. The present survey is meant to be a reasoned, albeit limited, catalog of such documents, including those that have been entered in the computer databases1 that I have developed over the last twenty years as a tool for my work on the reconstruction of the pronunciation of French at different stages of its development. One essential characteristic for inclusion in a base was the richness of the expected information on the pronunciation and the relatively large size of documents devised by the same grammarian or semi-literate scriptor to allow for some reliability of the results. The documents included in the databases can be divided into six categories ranging from transcriptions of French in non-Latin graphic systems (section 1) and documents written by

1 The documents signaled with the sign + under the heading db in the tables below have been included in the

databases; those with the sign ° are currently being entered.

2 Yves Charles Morin

semi-literate individuals (section 2), to texts for which the authors or printers deliberately chose to use a reformed spelling, either fully articulated (section 5) or succinctly sketched (section 6). Less radical are documents that used a conventional orthography enriched with additional diacritics for easier reading (section 3) and documents that adapted the conventional spelling to note non-standard pronunciations (section 4). In the last section, we give a short list of texts written in relatively standard orthographies, which could nonetheless cast some light on the pronunciation (section 7), none of which, however, have been included in the databases.

1 Texts with non-Latin conventional graphic systems

One occasionally finds documents that are written with a conventional graphic system other than Latin. They usually are too short to allow for in-depth analyses. The only exceptions are documents with French words written in Hebrew characters: glossaries, dictionaries, treatises and — rarely — poems (cf. Blondheim 1927). An inventory of known glossaries can be found in Banitt (1972:xiv–xv) [G1 to G6], three of which have been edited, and a fourth only partially, together with various fragments [F1 to F9] and dictionaries [D1 and D2]. These glossaries written with Hebrew characters must not be confused with modern editions of French glosses in Rashi’s commentaries (Darmesteter 1909, Darmesteter and Blondheim 1937) that try to recover the original forms of the Talmudic commentator from often quite corrupted copies found in later manuscripts.

Figure 1. Glossaire de Bâle, 6 first lines of fol. 27r° (from Banitt 1972)

Glossaries contain series of Hebrew expressions, either from the Bible or teachers’ commentaries, followed by their French equivalents, or le’azim, as appears in the excerpt of the Glossaire de Bâle given in Figure 1. In this excerpt, one can read several glosses in Latin characters later added by an early analyst; in particular chant son is a Latin transliteration of the la’az immediately below, which explains a Hebrew term found before on the same line.

French texts with non-standard orthography 3

The Traité des fièvres on the other hand is basically a French text entirely written with Hebrew characters, with only occasional Hebrew and Latin comments and prescriptions. Great hopes were entertained by the first scholars who examined these texts, in particular Darmesteter, that an alternate script would exhibit less graphic conservatism and add significantly to our knowledge on the phonetic characteristics of Old French. It appeared soon, however, that the use of the Hebrew script for French and for Latin belonged to a long tradition, which could also be quite conservative (cf. Banitt 1972:58). Different Hebrew characters could thus be used for Latin and French in the same medieval texts for sounds that medieval speakers certainly did not distinguish, such as samekh ס for Latin ‹s› and sin/shin ש for French ‹s› (besides tsadi צ for [s] < [ʦ]), probably because they belonged to independent scriptural traditions that developed at different times (cf. Banitt 1972:61, Kiwitt 2001:33). Conventional name date Editions and characteristics db Glossaire de Bâle (G1) 13th c. edition: Banitt 1972.

dialect: Champenois (prob.). +

Glossaire de Paris (G4) 13th c. edition: Lambert and Brandin 1905; the Hebrew characters of the French le’azim have not been edited, they are simply transliterated according to the authors’ own interpretation of their phonetic values, barring the possibility of a systematic reconstruction of the original Hebrew script. dialect: Lorrain (prob.).

+

Glossaire de Leipzig (G2)

end 13th c. edition: Banitt 1995–2005. dialect: Anglo-Norman, Norman.

Glossaire de Parme (G5) 14th c. edition: (partial): Siskin 1981. Traité des fièvres early 13th c. editions: Katzenellenbogen 1933, Kiwitt 2001; in Kiwitt’s

edition, the Hebrew characters are transliterated according to a protocol which preserves most of the information found in the original script. dialect: Bourguignon (prob.).

References Banitt, Menahem. 1972. Le glossaire de Bâle, 2 vol. Jérusalem: Académie nationale des

sciences et des lettres d’Israël. Banitt, Menahem. 1995–2005. Le glossaire de Leipzig, 4 vol. Jérusalem: Académie nationale

des sciences et des lettres d’Israël. Blondheim, David Simon. 1927. Poèmes judéo-français du Moyen Age. Paris: Champion. Blondheim, David Simon. 1937. Les gloses françaises dans les commentaires talmudiques de

Raschi, vol. 2: Études lexicographiques. Baltimore: The John Hopkins Press / London: Oxford University Press / Paris: «Les belles lettres».

Darmesteter, Arsène. 1909. Les gloses françaises de Raschi dans la Bible, accompagnées de notes par Louis Brandin et précédées d’une introduction par Julien Weill. Paris: Durlacher.

Darmesteter, Arsène and D. S Blondheim. 1929. Les gloses françaises dans les commentaires talmudiques de Raschi, vol 1. Paris: Champion.

Katzenellenbogen, Lucie. 1933. Eine altfranzösische Abhandlung über Fieber. Würzburg: Konrad Triltsch.


Kiwitt, Marc. 2001. Der altfranzösische Fiebertraktat Fevres: Teiledition und sprachwissen-schaftliche Untersuchung. [Würzburger medizinhistorische Forschungen 75]. Würzburg: Königshausen und Neumann.

Lambert, Mayer and Louis Brandin. 1905. Glossaire hébreu-français du XIIIe siècle. Recueil de mots hébreux bibliques avec traduction française. Paris: Leroux.

Siskin, Harley Jay. 1981. A partial edition of a fourteenth century biblical glossary: Ms Parma 2780, Ph.D. thesis. Ithaca: Cornell University.

2 Texts with deviant orthographies

There is a large body of research on deviant orthographies, usually of semi-literate scriptors from various social backgrounds (cf. Ernst 1999). A survey of the relevant documents is well beyond the scope of this paper. Many of them can be found in some of the raw materials used by historians of private life: private letters, intimate and travel diaries, “livres de raison” (family diaries/registers), memoirs (cf. Beaurepaire and Taurisson 2003), which more often than not, however, have been adapted to modern spelling conventions and need to be re-edited to be useful as linguistic documents. The very concept of deviant orthography may be ill suited for texts written during or before the fourteenth century, as their specific spelling may sometimes simply reflect a scriptural tradition of partial phonetic adjustment to a regional norm. One can probably find a complete continuum between the spelling innovations found in the Annales de Laval by Le Doyen (Figure 2) and those in the Haynin’s Mémoires (Figure 3).

Ceſt recitez en ce petit liuret Et aduiendra ou ſoit vil temps ou cher; Le temps futur, ſil ſera chault ou froit Soit guerre ou paix ſans mauluais temps ſerchez.

Figure 2. Annales de Laval by Le Doyen, f° 1r° (cf. Godberg–Beauluère, p. 6) lesquelles ne peulte touttes estre venues a ma connoisanse, pluseurs du Roiame se conplaindoite et doleoite. Et tant que de fet a la remonstranse et requeste du duc de Berry, seul frerre du roi et le plus prochain de la couronne, et de pluseurs autres prinches et segneurs de Roiame, estant desplaisant de che quil veoite le Roiame ensi gouverné et eux mime pareillement, desirant di pourveir et mettre remede de tout leur pooir come tenus, iestoite. Et afin qu’ensi en avenist, il proumerte l’eun a l’autre d’estre aidant et confortant et d’eus trouver et coumuniquier ensanble … Figure 3. Haynin’s Mémoires, f° 9v° (cf. Brouwers, vol. 1, p. 6)

Le Doyen is a royal notary in Laval, well accustomed to writing. He abides by the current orthographical system with its regional phonetic interpretation, e.g., ‹oi› for a [e] or [ɛ] sound in some words, such as froit ‘froid’. His only significant departure from the dominant normative patterns is the use of ‹z› in word-final position for ‹r› as in recitez or ſerchez in the


excerpt given above (which Godberg–Beauluère correct as ‹r›). This is a feature found in many manuscripts of the same period and probably reflects a phonetic development [r] > [ð] ~ Ø. On the other hand, Haynin is a member of the gentry, whose education was certainly more concerned with warfare than writing skills. His spelling reflects the current Picard scripta, e.g. ‹ch› for regional [ʃ] or [ʧ] in prinches and che and ‹ei› for [i] in pourveir ‘pourvoir’. One quite original feature, however, is the generalization of mute ‹e› in word final-position in 3sg endings, as in peulte (normally written peut, sometimes peult) and 3pl endings, as in conplaindoite (for regional complaindoient) or proumerte (for pro(u)mirent), which signals the retention of word-final [t], a normal feature of Picard, still found in modern dialects with the 3pl ending. Lodge (2004:143, 166–167) lists, together with large excerpts, some classic examples of deviant orthographies relevant to the history of Parisian French. A larger corpus, including other regions has been undertaken and is described by Ernst and Wolf (2002). Another large corpus for varieties of French spoken between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries in North America and Northwestern France is under construction and described in Martineau (to appear) and Bénéteau and Martineau (2006). Conventional name date Editions and characteristics db Mémoires de Haynin 1465–1477 edition: Brouwers 1905.

dialect: Hainaut Picard. +

Annales de Laval de Le Doyen

1480–1537 edition: Godberg–Beauluère 1859 – poor edition, currently being revised after ms. BnF. f. fr. 11512. dialect: Mayenne dialect.

°

Mémoires de Ménétra 1768¬1802. edition: Roche 1982; adapted to modern spelling. dialect: Parisian French.

Œuvres poétiques de Ménétra

? –1802 edition: none – found in the same ms. as the Mémoires dialect: Parisian French. +

Journal de Lepailleur 1839–1845 edition: Aubin (1982); adapted to modern spelling. dialect: Québec French. °

References Beaurepaire, Pierre-Yves and Dominique Taurisson (eds.). 2003. Les ego-documents à

l’heure de l’électronique. Nouvelles approches des espaces et des réseaux relationnels. Montpellier: Presses universitaires de Montpellier.

Bénéteau, Marcel and France Martineau. 2006. “Le « Journaille » de Barthe: incursion dans le français du Détroit sous le régime anglais”. La passion des lettres – Études de littérature médiévale et québécoise en hommage à Yvan Lepage, Pierre Berthiaume and Christian Vanderdorpe (eds.), 165–178. Ottawa: Éditions David.

Ernst, Gerhard. 1999. “Zwischen Alphabetisierung und « français populaire écrit ». Zur Graphie privater französischer Texte des 17. und 18. Jahrhunderts”. Sociolinguistica 13.91–111.

Ernst, Gerhard and B. Wolf. 2002. Journal de Chavatte (CD-rom).Tübingen: Niemeyer. Haynin, Jean de. 1905. Mémoires de Jean, sire de Haynin et de Louvignies, 1465–1477, D. D.

Brouwers (ed.). Liège: Denis Cormaux (Société des bibliophiles liégeois). Le Doyen, Guillaume. 1859. Annales et chronicques du pais de Laval et parties

circonvoisines, depuis l’an de Nostre Seigneur Jhesu-Crist 1480 jusqu’a l’année 1537,


avec un préambule retrospectif du temps anticque, jadis composée par feu maistre Guillaume le Doyen, en son vivant notaire Roïal au Comté de Laval, publiées pour la 1re fois par M. H. Godberg, avec notes et esclaircissements de M. Louis de la Beauluère, correspondant du ministère de l’instruction publicque pour les travaux historicques. Laval: Honoré Godberg.

Lepailleur, François-Maurice. 1996. Journal d’un patriote exilé en Australie 1839–1845, Georges Aubin (ed.). Sillery: Septentrion.

Lodge, R. Anthony. 2004. A sociolinguistic history of Parisian French. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press.

Martineau, France. to appear. “Perspectives sur le changement linguistique: aux sources du français canadien”. Canadian Journal of Linguistics/La revue canadienne de linguistique 50.

Martineau, France. to appear. “Le français de la région du Détroit, un français de la frontière?” Cahiers Charlevoix.

Martineau, France. to appear. “Variation in Canadian French usage from the 18th to the 19th century”. Multilingua.

Ménétra, Jacques-Louis. 1982. Journal de ma vie: Jacques-Louis Ménétra, compagnon vitrier au XVIIIe siècle, Daniel Roche (ed.). Paris: Montalba.

3 Annotated conventional orthography

Many grammarians felt the necessity to remedy the phonetic opacity of the conventional orthography by adding some diacritical marks. Sylvius (1531) even championed a two-tiered orthography for French: one tier for the etymological representation of words and a superposed tier for their pronunciation, e.g. ‹g› for [ɡ], ‹gu› for [ɡw], ‹gſ › for [z] in ‹ligſ ons› for (nous) lisons, ‹cſſ› for [s] in ‹poı cſſer› for poisser, etc., including a diacritic to mark mute letters ‹s ̍›, ‹t̍›, etc. Accented vowel-letters such as ‹é, è, ê› and ‹ç› with a cedilla are the only annotations still found in the standard orthography that can be traced back to Sylvius’ proposal. The use of diacritics to mark mute letters also found its way into some manuals for the learning of French as a second language. Sainliens, alias Holliband, (1566–1580) and Milleran (1692) made a regular use of such diacritics, which can now be most usefully applied to the study of liaison and elision (cf. Crevier 1993, 1994). For instance, the following excerpt from Sainliens shows that word-final ‹t› and ‹z› where silent before a consonant (où eſ ͓t ͓ le, preſ ͓tez ͓ moy) and articulated before a vowel (quant à, eſ ͓tiez en vn) and at the pause (aiſément, que):

quant à voſ ͓tre ͓haquenée, elle va lẻs et ͓ du ſoleil : courage, ie voy la ville ambles auſſi aiſément, que ſi vous eſ ͓tiez Logerons ͓ nous aux ͓ faul ͓x ͓bourg ̽s, ou en vn bateau: preſ ͓tez ͓ moy voſ ͓tre ͓ e- en la ville ? où eſ ͓t ͓ le mei ͓lleur logis? ſcharpe de Taffetas, à cauſe de la poul ͓dre ͓

Figure 4. Sainliens, Littleton (1566 f° A iiij r°)


Some early printers may also have put this system to a more general use. Estiene Caveiller in his edition of Burrier (1542) used “un système orthographique complet et tout à fait nouveau” (Beaulieux 1927:43). The facsimile of the printer’s notice given by Catach (1968:276) shows that mute letters are marked with a subscript ‹–̩›, e.g. chaſ ̩cun, endroict̩, cogn̩oiſ ̩tre, quel ̩s; a subscript dot indicates the consonant value of ‹i› and ‹u/v›, e.g. ịuſque, ṿous, oeuụre; ‹ƚ› notes palatal [ʎ], e.g. fueiƚet ̩s; ‹ţ› has the same function as ‹ç›, e.g. c ̣onſerụaţion. An internal dot may also appear inside the body of the following letters ‹c ̣ e ̣ h ̣ m ̣ n ̣›, whose distinctive function is not altogether obvious. Authors date Characteristics db Burrier, Antoine 1542 Mute letters are marked with a subscript ‹– ̩›, values of ‹i, v/u,

e› distinguished with subscript or superscript dots, ‹ƚ› for palatal [ʎ], ‹c, e, h, m, n› marked with internal dots.

Sainliens, Claude 1566 Mute letters are marked with a subscript ‹– ͓› or superscript ‹– ̽›. ° Milleran, René 1692 Mute letters are in italics (or in roman in italicized words). +

References Burrier, Antoine. 1542. Les Loix, statutz et ordonnances roiaulx, faictes par les feus roys de

France, puis le règne de monseigneur sainct Lois jusques au règne du roy François premier du nom à présent régnant. Les ordonnances, statutz et édicts faicts par le roy François jusques en l’an mil cinq cents quarante deus. Le tout reveu, corrigé et vérifié aus originauls... en obseruant l’orthographe des apostrophes et collision des voieles descendants des deux langues greque et latine. Paris: Estiene Caveiller (printer) for Poncet le Preux and Galiot du Pré (booksellers).

Dubois, Jacques (Sylvius). 1998. Introduction à la langue française suivie d’une grammaire, translation and notes by Colette Demaizière of Sylvius (1531). Paris: Champion.

Crevier, Isabelle. 1993. “René Milleran, grammairien et réformateur de l’orthographe au XVIIe siècle”. Travaux de linguistique et de philologie 31.347–365.

Crevier, Isabelle. 1994. La liaison à la fin du XVIIe siècle dans La Nouvelle gram ̃aire françoise de René Milleran, de Saumur. Ph.D. thesis. Montréal: Université de Montréal.

Milleran, René. 1692. La nouvelle gram ̃aire françoise. Marseille: Henri Brebion. Sainliens, Claude [Claudius Holliband]. 1566. The French Littelton. A most easie, perfect,

and absolute vvay to learne the frenche tongue: newly set forth by Claudius Hollidand. London: Thomas.

Sainliens, Claude [Claudius Hollyband]. 1573. The French school-master. London: Abraham Veale.

Sainliens, Claude [Claudii a Sancto Vinculo]. 1580. De pronuntiatione linguae gallicae. London: Thomas.

Sylvius, Jacobus. 1531. Linguam Gallicam Isagωge, una cum eiusdem Grammatica Latino-gallica, ex Hebraeis, Graecis et Latinis authoribus. Paris: Robert Estienne.


4 Phonetic use of conventional orthography

Conventional orthography may also be adapted to render pronunciations that do not conform to the prevalent norm, or at least what the author considered it to be. Such “phonetic” transcriptions of what could be considered genuine speech are relatively rare. One may mention Jean Héroard’s Journal (Ernst 1985, Foisil 1989) in which the author, a physician, recorded verbatim the conversations between the future King of France and his entourage, adapting the orthography to reflect the pronunciation of the young king (at least until he considered it to be no longer divergent from that of the adult norm). One also occasionally finds small passages in literary written works, where the authors tried to give an indication of some actual pronunciation (cf. Saint-Gérand, 2004). More often than not, however, this technique is used with definite parodic intentions, where the stereotypical features associated with the variety of speech they portray are often grossly multiplied (cf. Lodge 2004:136, 137, 154–158, 173–175, 210–214, 224–225 for Parisian French; some of the documents he presents are available from http://www.ahds.ac.uk/collections/ as Paris speech in the past lll-2423-1 [as of November 30, 2006]). Divergent pronunciations are usually signaled through modifications to the current orthographic usage, in ways that are sometimes difficult to interpret.

Lamant deſpourueu de ſon eſperit eſcri- May ne le dite pa pourtan uant a ſamie, uoulant parler Les muſaille on derozeille: le courtiſan. Celuy que fet les gran merueille MA Dame ie vourayme tan Nou doin bien to couché enſemble,

Figure 5. Le beau fils de Paris (1549:270) The omission of word-final letters in Le beau fils de Paris, as in tan (= tant) or couché (= coucher), not only indicates that they were not sounded in the speech portrayed, but are a tell tale sign that final [-t] and [-r] were retained in the “polite” pronunciation. The presence of final graphic ‹-s› in les, however, does not indicate that an [-s] or [-z] was pronounced before fran in les fran merueille, as this spelling conforms to the regular spelling convention allowing ‹-s› to be mute in such context. It is not clear, on the other hand, why the author (or the printer) used Nou (= Nous) in Nou doin, as the regular orthographic Nous would have signaled the same pronunciation. (The retention of ‹-s› after ‹e› in les, as in les fran merueille, may actually have been prompted by the desire to keep a mark of the plural.)


Conventional name date Editions and characteristics db Le beau fils de Paris 1549 editions: J. de Tournes 1549:270–276, Guiffrey 1881:670–

680. dialect: Parisian popular French (?).

+

Dialogue de trois vignerons du Maine de Jean Sousnor

1624 edition: s.l., BnF 8 - LB36 - 2251. dialect: Mayenne dialect. +

Mazarinades 1649–1651 editions: Rosset 1911, Deloffre 1961. dialect: Parisian rural French. +

References Ernst, Gerhard. 1985. Gesprochenes Französisch zu Beginn des 17. Jahrhunderts. Direkte

Rede in Jean Héroards “Histoire particulière de Louis XIII”. Tübingen: Niemeyer. Deloffre, Frédéric (ed.). 1961. Agréables conférences de deux paysans de Saint-Ouen et de

Montmorency sur les affaires du temps (1649–1651). Paris: «Les Belles Lettres». Foisil, Madeleine (ed.). 1989. Journal de Jean Héroard, médecin de Louis XIII. Paris: Fayard. Marot, Clément. 1459. Les Œuvres de Clément Marot, de Cahors, vallet de chambre du Roy.

Lyon: Jean de Tournes. Marot, Clément. 1881. Œuvres de Clément Marot de Cahors en Quercy, Valet de chambre du

Roy, augmentée d’un grand nombre de ses compositions par ci-devant non imprimées, vol. 3, Georges Guiffrey (ed.). Paris: Imprimerie A. Quantin.

Lodge, R. Anthony. 2004. A sociolinguistic history of Parisian French. Cambridge/New York: Cambridge University Press.

Rosset, Théodore (ed.). 1911. Dix conférences en patois de la banlieue parisienne. Paris: Colin.

Sousnor, Jean, Sieur de la Nichilière (alias Jean Rousson). 1624. Dialogue de trois vignerons du pays du Maine sur les miseres de ce temps. s. l.

Saint-Gérand, Jacques-Philippe. 2004. “Échos d’une oralité problématique: représentations et reconstitutions en question”. Langue du XIXe siècle. http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/ epc/langueXIX/oralite/ [as of November 30, 2006].

5 Spelling reformers

The Renaissance renewed interest in the pronunciation of Latin and its relation to spelling soon extended to vernacular language. Meigret and Peletier were the forerunner, in the middle of the sixteenth century, of a never-ending debate on a never fully completed reform of French orthography. In often-passionate discussions, the protagonists gave us invaluable information on the pronunciation of French, and a key to understanding the phonetic regularities embodied in the various reformed spellings put forward. The concrete proposals made by spelling reformers are useful only insofar as there survived a large enough body of texts embodying a specific reform with relatively infrequent inconsistencies — reformers indeed often blame the carelessness of printers for many of the blemishes in their work. It must also be emphasized that, contrary to optimistic views, spelling reformers are not necessarily aware of the phonemic distinctions in their own usage of French and, if they are,


do not necessarily put forward a new orthography that allows such distinctions to be represented. They are usually convinced that their own usage — which they embody in their spelling — is representative of some well-established norm, which accounts for the specific regional characteristics one often finds in their texts.

5.1 Teachers

One may distinguish two groups of reformers. The first comprises schoolteachers, tutors, or religious instructors, whose long experience teaching children or ordinary persons how to read convinced them that the reformation of spelling was a social, if not moral, necessity. Rambaud’s spelling system (1578) was somewhat of an abugida in which the majority of the symbols do not represent simple indivisible sounds, but complete syllables. There were no obvious resemblances between the shape of these symbols and those of the Latin alphabet (cf. figure 6). Rambaud’s contribution to the debate on French orthography was probably nil.

& nonchalance, & le grand tort que nous leur faiſons: car les faiſons fail fir, & puis apres les tormentons: nous faiſons les fautes, & les poures Figure 6. Rambaud script (pp. 62–63)

Le Gaygnard’s influence was not any greater. His book contains long lists of words, but no connected text. It is difficult to have a precise idea of the ways he intended specific words to be spelled, not only because he often applied his reform only to such parts of words as were relevant to some topic under discussion at that moment, but mostly because the printer did an extremely poor work, making it difficult sometimes to even guess which were the words the author actually intended to give as examples (cf. Morin, to appear).

On le fait, en mettant la main drète au front, puis a lestomac, ensuite a l’épaule gauche, et de


la a la drète en disant : In nomine Patris et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti.

Figure 7. Vaudelin script (1715:137)

Although Vaudelin’s (cf. Figure 7) and Féline’s scripts were less radically departing from the conventional Latin script, they did not leave any trace either in the later adjustments made to the French orthography. Linguists, however, often used them as reliable transcriptions of earlier stages of the pronunciation of Standard Parisian French (cf. Cohen’s 1946 and Martinet’s 1946 analysis of Vaudelin’s work). Thurot (1881: LXXXVII) hailed Féline’s work as “le guide le plus sûr que je connaisse pour la prononciation de notre temps” (the most reliable guide I know for the current pronunciation [of French]). Conventional name date Editions and characteristics db Rambaud 1578 edition: J. de Tournes, Lyon.

observations: syllabic abugida not abiding to the orthogra-phic principle, not readable without complete retraining, also used for Latin and Provençal. dialect: Marseilles regional French.

+

Le Gaygnard 1609 edition: J. Berjon, Paris. observations: regular alphabet without new characters. dialect: Poitou regional French.

Vaudelin, Gile 1713–1715 editions: Vve J. Cot and J.-B. Lamesle, Paris: 1713; J.-B. Lamesle, Paris: 1715. observations: very large number of new characters, reduced e not represented, not readable without specific training. dialect: no obvious regional features.

+

Féline, Adrien 1848–1854 edition: Firmin-Didot, Paris: 1851 (dictionary). + editions: Guillaumin, Paris: 1848; Firmin-Didot, Paris: 1852,

1854. observations: true “phonetic alphabet”; ‹ε, ε ̂› for [œ, ø], ‹û› for [u] and ‹u› for [y], ‹a ̠, i ̠, o ̠, u ̠› for nasal vowels, ‹h› for [ʃ], ‹ḡ› for [ɲ] and ‹l ̠› for [ʎ]. dialect: minimal Parisian system.

References Cohen, Marcel. 1946. Le français en 1700 d’après le témoignage de Gile Vaudelin. Paris:

Honoré Champion. Féline, Adrien. 1848. Mémoire sur la réforme de l’alphabet, à l’exemple de celle des poids et

mesure. Paris: Guillaumin. Féline, Adrien. 1851. Dictionnaire de la prononciation de la langue française indiquée au

moyen de caractères phonétiques précédé d’un mémoire sur la réforme de l’alphabet. Paris: Firmin-Didot.

Féline, Adrien. 1852. Ekritur Fonetik – Tablô dε lêktur. Paris: Firmin-Didot. Féline, Adrien. 1854. Méthode pour apprendre à lire par le système phonétique. Paris:

Firmin-Didot.


Le Gay[g]nard, Pierre. 1609. L’Aprenmolire françois, pour aprendre les jeunes enfans et les estrangers à lire en peu de temps les mots des escritures françoizes, nouvellement inventé et mis en lumière, avec la vraye ortographe françoize. Paris: J. Berjon.

Hermans, Huguette. 1985. La « déclaration des abus » d’Honorat Rambaud comme témoin du système phonologique du moyen français. Doctoral dissertation. Louvain: Katholieke Universiteit Leuven.

Martinet, André. 1946 [1947]. Note sur la phonologie du français vers 1700. Bulletin de la Société de Linguistique 43.13–23. Reprinted 1969, in Le français sans fard, pp. 155–167, Paris: PUF.

Morin, Yves Charles. 2004. The implantation of French in Marseilles during the sixteenth century. The French Language and Questions of Identity, Colloquium held at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, 7–8 July 2004.

Morin, Yves Charles. to appear (ms 2006). “Le Gaygnard (1609): L’ancienne orthographe, la nouvelle pédagogie et la réforme orthographique”. Normes et pratiques orthographiques, Alain Desrochers, France Martineau and Yves Charles Morin (eds.). Ottawa: Éditions David.

Rambaud, Honorat. 1578. La déclaration des abus que lon commet en escrivant. Lyon: Iean de Tournes.

Thurot, Charles. 1881–1883. De la prononciation française depuis le commencement du XVIe siècle, d’après le témoignage des grammairiens, 3 vol. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale.

Vaudelin, Gile. 1713. Nouvelle manière d’écrire comme on parle en France. Paris: Veuve Jean Cot and Jean-Baptiste Lamesle.

Vaudelin, Gile. 1715. Instructions cretiennes mises en ortographe naturelle pour faciliter au peuple la lecture de la sience du salut. Paris: Jean-Baptiste Lamesle.

5.2 Humanists

Humanists were less concerned with social issues — although there are notable exceptions, e.g., Lesclache — than internal consistency with an orthographic principle requiring spelling to be a faithful “mirror” of the pronunciation of the language, as they found argued in some of the earlier Latin grammarians’ works. The pronunciation on which they based their orthography strongly reflected that of their native regional variety, as contemporary witnesses did not fail to highlight. Pasquier thus commented in a letter to Ramus the regional features he noted in Meigret’s, Peletier’s, Baïf”s and Ramus’ works:

Ceux qui mettent la main à la plume prennent leur origine de divers païs de la France, et est mal-aisé qu’en nostre prononciation il ne demeure tousjours en nous je ne sçay quoy du ramage de nostre païs. ‘Those who put their hand to the pen originate from various parts of France and it is uneasy for one not to retain in his pronunciation some ineffable part of his birthplace’s ways of sounding’. (quoted by Firmin-Didot 1868:195, Pasquier 1723, tome 2, page 65)


As a rule, humanists’ reformed spellings retained much of the familiar aspects of traditional spelling and mostly used diacritics to further distinguish between the different phonetic values of ambiguous letters, in particular accented vowels and cedilla ‹ç›, which eventually found their way into the modern orthography. Meigret’s and Peletier’s works make up the two largest corpora of homogeneous documents. Their usefulness is nonetheless tempered by the typographical canons of that time, which limited to one the number of accents a word could receive and which did not find fit to use diacritic marks to forms that would not otherwise be ambiguous. With the exception of Peletier’s work, documents written in a specific reformed spelling were produced within a relatively short period of time. Notwithstanding the restrictions mentioned earlier, Peletier’s work is extremely rich and presents a variegated sample of texts bearing on issues as diverse as grammar, mathematics, poetic rhetoric and actual poetical creations, written over a period of thirty years during which he adjusted his transcriptions to the changing mores in the recognized norms of pronunciation. Reformer date Editions and characteristics db Meigret 1548–1551 editions: Chrestien, Paris: 1548, 1550a, 1550b, 1550c, 1551.

observations: few new characters – sandhis indicated between host and clitics. dialect: Lyon regional French.

+

Peletier du Mans 1550–1581 editions: Marnef, Poitiers: 1550; J. de Tournes, Lyon: 1554a, 1555a, 1555b, 1555c; R. Coulombel, Paris: 1581; Monferran: 1996; Arnaud et al.: 2005.

+

edition: J. de Tournes, Lyon: 1554b. ° observations: new characters.

dialect: Maine regional French.

Ramus 1562 edition: A. Wechel, Paris: 1562. observations: few new characters – sandhis indicated between host and clitics.

+

1572 editions: A. Wechel, Paris: 1572; Du Val, Paris: 1587. observations: relatively more new characters than previously – sandhis (except regular elision) are no longer indicated; the characters and the inventory of vowels are different from those of the previous editions.

+

dialect: Picard regional French. Poisson, Robert 1609 edition: J. Planchon, Paris: 1609.

observations: some new characters, circumflex above consonants. dialect: Norman regional French.

+

Simon, Estienne 1609 edition: J. Gesselin, Paris: 1609. observations: regular alphabet without new characters, double letters for long vowels and [s]. Very limited corpus (4 pages). dialect: unidentified regional French.

+

Dobert, Antoine 1650 edition: F. de Masso, Lyon: 1650. observations: regular alphabet without new characters, ‹k› for [k]. dialect: unidentified.

Lesclache, Louis de 1668 edition: L. Rondet, Paris: 1668. observations: regular alphabet without new characters. dialect: Auvergne regional French.

°


Lartigaut, Antoine 1669 edition: L. Ravenau and J. D’Ouri, Paris: 1669. observations: regular alphabet without new characters. dialect: Picard regional French.

+

Mercure de Trévoux 1708 appeared in a periodic journal. observations: regular alphabet without new characters, radical simplification and neutralization of vowels distinctions. dialect: unidentified.

Marle, C.-L. 1827–1829 editions: appeared in periodic journals, and Dupont, Paris: 1829. observations: regular alphabet without new characters. dialect: unidentified.

References Dobert, le père Antoine. 1650. Récréations literales et mysterieuses, où sont curieusement

estalez les principes et l’importance de la nouvelle orthographe, avec un acheminement à la connoissance de la poësie, et des anagrammes. Lyon: F. de Masso.

Lartigaut, Antoine. 1669. Les progrès de la véritable ortografe ou l’ortografe francêze fondée sur ses principes. Paris: Laurant Ravenau and Jan D’Ouri.

Le Gay[g]nard, Pierre. 1609. L’Aprenmolire françois, pour aprendre les jeunes enfans et les estrangers à lire en peu de temps les mots des escritures françoizes, nouvellement inventé et mis en lumière, avec la vraye ortographe françoize. Paris: J. Berjon.

Lesclache, Louis de. 1668. Les véritables règles de l’ortografe francèze ou l’art d’aprandre an peu de tams à écrire côrectement. Paris: Laurent Rondet.

Marle, C.-L. 1827–1829. “Orthographe – plan de réforme: Appel aux Français, Réforme orthographique”. Journal de la langue française, didactique et littéraire (4 vol.).

Marle, C.-L. 1828. Ortografe raizonable mize en pratique, par Voltaire, Montesquieu, Beaumarchais, Wailly, Richelet, et tous les filozofes qui ont réfléchi sur notre langue écrite. [Signed: Marle aîné.] (Extrait du Journal grammatical). Paris: Marle.

Marle, C.-L. 1829. Manuel de la diagraphie, découverte qui simplifie l’étude de la langue, par M. Marle aîné,… Paris: impr. de P. Dupont.

Meigret, Louis. 1548. Le menteur ou l’incrédule, de Lucien de Samosate, traduit de gręc ęn françoęs, auęq vne ecritture qadrant à la prolaçion françoęse. Paris: Chrestian [sic] Wechel.

Meigret, Louis. 1550a. Le trętté de la grammęre françoęze. Paris: Chrestien Wechel. Meigret, Louis. 1550b. Defęnses de Louís Meigręt touchant son orthographíe, contre lęs

çęnsures ę calõnies de Glaumalis du Vezelet, ę de sęs adherans. Paris: Chrestien Wechel.

Meigret, Louis. 1550c. La reponse de Louís Meigręt a l’apolojíe de Iáqes Pelletier. Paris: Chrestien Wechel.

Meigret, Louis. 1551. Reponse de Louís Meigręt a la dezesperée repliqe de Glaomalis de Vezelet, transformé ęn Gyllaome dęs Aotels. Paris: Chrestien Wechel.

Mercure de Trévoux. 1708. Projet d’un Esei de granmére francése de laqele on ôte toutes lés letres inutiles, é où l’on ficse la prononsiasion de celes qi sont néceséres… – Remarques sur ce projet, en forme de lettre – Réponse de l’Auteur du projet à cette lettre. Mercure de Trévouz, November and December.

Morin, Yves Charles. 2004. “Peletier du Mans et les normes de prononciation de la durée vocalique au XVIe siècle”. Les normes du dire au XVIe siècle, Jean-Claude Arnould and Gérard Milhe Poutingon (eds), 421–434. Paris: Champion.


Pasquier, Estienne. 1956. Choix de lettres sur la littérature, la langue et la traduction, Dorothy Thickett (ed.). Geneva: Droz.

Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1550. Dialogue̸ de̸ l’ortografe̸ et prononciacion françoęse ̸. Poitiers: Marnef.

Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1554a. L’Algèbre̸. Lyon: Jean de Tournes. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1554b. L’Arithmétique̸. Lyon: Jean de Tournes. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1555a. L’Art Poëtique̸. Lyon: Jean de Tournes and Guil. Gazean. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1555b. Dialogue̸ de̸ l’ortografe̸ et prononciacion françoęse ̸, 2nd

ed. Lyon: Jean de Tournes. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1555c. L’amour des amours – Vers lirique̸s. Lyon: Jean de

Tournes. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1581. Euvre̸s Poetique̸s, intituléz Louange ̸s avęq quelque ̸s autre̸s

Ecriz du mę́me̸ Auteur, ancore̸s non publiéz. Paris: Robert Coulombel. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 1996. L’amour des amours, Jean-Charles Monferran (ed.). Paris:

Société des textes français modernes. Peletier du Mans, Jacques. 2005. Euvres poetiques intitulez louanges aveq quelques autres

ecriz, Sophie Arnaud, Stephen Bamforth and Jan Miernowski (eds.). Œuvres complètes, vol. 10, Isabelle Pantin (dir.). Paris: Honoré Champion.

Poisson, Robert. 1609. Alfabet nouveau de la vrée et pure ortografe fransoize et modéle sus iselui en forme de dixionére. Paris: Jaqes Planchon.

Rambaud, Honorat. 1578. La déclaration des abus que lon commet en escrivant. Lyon: Iean de Tournes.

Ramus, Pierre La Ramée, dit Petrus. 1562. Gramere. Paris: André Wechel. Ramus, Pierre La Ramée, dit Petrus. 1572. Grammaire de P. de La Ramée, lecteur du Roy en

luniversité de Paris. Paris: André Wechel. Ramus, Pierre La Ramée, dit Petrus. 1587. Grammaire de P. de La Ramée, lecteur du Roy en

l’Université de Paris, reveue et enrichie en plusieurs endroits. Paris: D. Du Val. Simon, Étienne. 1609. La vraye et ancienne orthographe françoise restaurée: tellement que

desormais l’on apprandra parfetement à lire & à escrire & encor avec tant de facilité & breveté, que ce sera en moins de mois, que l’on ne faisoit d’années. Paris: J. Gesselin.

6 Texts with reformed spellings

A large number of other works have been published for which the printer — either on his own or at the author’s request — used non-traditional spellings, for which little or no justification is presented. One of the first systematic study of such innovative spellings is that of Firmin-Didot (1868), who used labels such as “personal orthography”, “intelligent personal orthography”, “independent orthography”, “containing instructive details” to describe them. This was later completed by Beaulieux (1927) and recent systematic studies of sixteenth and seventeenth-century spelling systems (Catach 1968 and Biedermann-Pasques 1992). On the basis of these analyses and of an earlier and quite succinct “survey” by Le Gaygnard (1609), I have selected a tentative list of potentially informative documents. They are listed in this section when the printer or the author used what may be considered a reformed spelling,


whether original or adopted from someone else; they appear in the next section when the spelling — without being as innovative — appears to embody distributional regularities that may reveal some of the phonetic properties of the variety of French they use. The criteria used for this selection do not bear on the quality of the spelling systems as is normally examined in these works on orthography, but rather on prospective usefulness for the discovery of new information on the pronunciation; thus we include Domergue’s work in spite of Firmin-Didot’s severe critique (1868:306). Conversely, some editions have been omitted which are often singled out for the originality of their spelling reforms, such as Fouquelin (1555) or Tahureau (1555, 1565). The editions that I have consulted (Fouquelin 1557, Tahureau 1555, 1567), for instance, do not appear to warrant the large investment required to enter such documents into a computer database, as they would probably not add to our knowledge of the evolution of French pronunciation. (This conclusion, however, does not necessarily apply to the editions of Fouquelin 1555 and Tahureau 1565, which I have not yet consulted.) Printers, as already mentioned, found it very difficult to follow the authors’ instructions, and more often than not departed from their plans. When the principles governing the new orthography are clearly presented, it is possible to identify as mistakes forms that blatantly contravene them. With texts written in a reformed orthography with little indication on its nature, however, printer’s mistakes are more difficult to notice, in particular with relatively short texts that do not allow for statistical control of the results. The list below also contains the work of Jean-Antoine de Baïf written with his reformed spelling, most of which has not been printed during his lifetime and only survived in one autograph manuscript. The Pléiade poet announced a forthcoming grammar in which he would expose the characteristics of his script, which however was never published or has since been definitely lost. A comparison of his manuscript with his Ẻtrẻnes de poẻzie fransoęze an vęrs mezurẻs (1574), the only one of his printed texts using the reformed script, shows that printing imposed heavy constraints on the liberty of spelling reformers. In his manuscript, Baïf made a rich use of diacritics above vowel-symbols: breve vs. macron for poetic meter, grave vs. circumflex accent for phonological length and acute accents for ‘adverbs’ as well as for some still unidentified usage (cf Morin 1999b). The use of accents, however, is quite limited in the printed work; in particular his new characters never appear in print combined with a circumflex accent. Author date Editions and characteristics db Taillemont, Claude de 1556 editions: J. Temporal, Lyon, fac simile in Pérouse 1989.

observations: one new character and various diacritics; cf. Beaulieux 1927:54. dialect: Lyon regional French.

°

Baïf, Jean-Antoine de 1569–?? editions: D. du Val 1574, Paris; Groth 1888; Bird 1964. observations: new characters (the 1574 printed material used the same fonts as Ramus 1572 with different phonetic values). dialect: no obvious regional features.

+


Joubert, Laurent 1578–1579 editions: S. Millanges, Bordeaux: 1578, N. Chesneau, Paris: 1579. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:203. dialect: (the author originates from Valence in Dauphiné).

Boessieres, Jean de 1580 edition: T. Ancelin, Lyon. observations: cf. Le Gaygnard (1609:168), Beaulieux 1927:55. dialect: (the author originates from Montferrand in Auvergne).

Bomier, Jan 1596 edition: J. Portau, Niort. observations: cf. Le Gaygnard 1609:168. dialect: unknown.

Moinet, Simon 1663 edition: S. Moinet, Amsterdam. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:230. dialect: (the author identifies himself as “Parisian”).

Domergue, Urbain 1794–1806 editions: F. Barret, Paris: 1794; Librairie économique, Paris: 1805, 1806. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:306, Millet 1933. dialect: (the author originates from Aubagne in Provence).

References Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1569. Psautier [A], BnF ms. fr. 19140, f° 123–184. Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1573. Psautier [B], BnF ms. fr. 19140, f° 1–121. Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1574. Ẻtrẻnes de poẻzie fransoęze an vęrs mezurẻs. Paris: Denys du

Val. Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1570–87(?). Chansonnettes, BnF ms. fr. 19140, f° 311–374. Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1888. Psaultier: metrische Bearbeitung der Psalmen, Ernst Joh. Groth

(ed.). [Sammlung französischer Neudruke herausgegeben von Karl Vollmöller, n° 9]. Heilbronn: Verlag von Gebr. Henninger.

Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1964. Chansonnettes – Édition critique, G. C. Bird (ed.). Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.

Baïf, Jean-Antoine de. 1966. Chansonnettes en vers mesurés, Barbara Anne Terry (ed.). Birmingham, Alabama: Birmingham Printing.

Beauchatel, Christophle de. 1579. “Annotacions sur l’orthographie”. Traité du ris, Laurent Joubert 1579:390–407.

Beaulieux, Charles. 1927. Histoire de l’orthographe française, vol. 2. Les accents et autres signes auxiliaires. Paris: Champion.

Biedermann-Pasques, Liselotte. 1992. Les grands courants orthographiques au XVIIe siècle et la formation de l’orthographe moderne – Impacts matériels, interférences phoniques, théories et pratiques (1606–1736). Tübingen: Niemeyer.

Boessieres, Jean de. 1580. L’Arioste francoes,... avec les argumans et allégories sur châcun chant. (Suivi de: Epitre et advertissemant aux Francoés, by J. Bouchet.) Lyon: T. Ancelin.

Bomier, Jan. 1596. Les Aforismes d’Hipocrate expliquez en vers françois. Niort: J. Portau. Catach, Nina. 1968. L’orthographe française à l’époque de la Renaissance (auteurs,

imprimeurs, ateliers d’imprimerie). Geneva: Droz. Domergue, Urbain. 1794 [an V]. La prononciation françoise, déterminée par des signes

invariables, avec application à divers morceaux, en prose et en vers, contenant tout ce qu’il faut pour lire avec correction et avec goût; suivie de notions orthographiques et de la nomenclature des mots à difficulté. Paris: F. Barret.

Domergue, Urbain. 1805. Manuel des étrangers amateurs de la langue françoise, ouvrage... contenant tout ce qui a rapport aux genres et à la prononciation, et dans lequel l’auteur


a prosodié, avec des caractères dont il est l’inventeur, la traduction qu’il a faite en vers françois de cent cinquante distiques latins, des dix églogues de Virgile, de deux odes d’Horace, et quelques morceaux en prose de sa composition. Paris: Librairie économique.

Domergue, Urbain. 1806. La prononciation françoise, où l’auteur a prosodié, avec des caractères dont il est l’inventeur, sa traduction en vers des dix églogues de Virgile et quelques autres morceaux de sa composition; augmentée d’un tableau des désinences françoises, pour faciliter l’étude des genres: manuel indispensable pour les étranger, amateurs de cette langue, infiniment utile aux François eux-mêmes, 2e édition. Paris: Librairie économique.

Firmin-Didot, Ambroise. 1868. Observations sur l’orthographe, ou, Ortografie française; suivies d’une Histoire de la réforme orthographique depuis le XVe siècle jusqu’à nos jours, 2nd rev. ed. Paris: Ambroise Firmin-Didot.

Fouquelin, Antoine, alias Foclin. 1555. La rhétorique françoise. Paris: Wechel. Fouquelin, Antoine. 1557. La rhétorique francoise – Nouvellement reueüe et augmentée.

Paris: Wechel. Joubert, Laurent. 1578. Erreurs populaires au fait de la médecine et régime de santé corrigés

par M. Laur. Joubert. Bourdeaus: S. Millanges. Joubert, Laurent. 1579. Traité du ris: contenant son essance, ses causes, et mervelheus effais,

curieusemant recerchés, raisonnés & observés; Un dialogue sur la cacographie fransaise: avec des annotacions sur l’orthographie. Paris: chez Nicolas Chesneau.

Millet, abbé Adrien. 1933. Les Grammairiens et la phonétique ou l'enseignement des sons du français depuis le XVIe siècle jusqu'à nos jours. Paris: Monnier.

Moinet, Simon. 1663. La Rome ridicule du sieur de Saint-Amant, travestië à la nouvêle ortografe, pur invantiön de Simon Moinêt, Parisiïn. Amsterdam: Simon Moinêt.

Morin, Yves Charles. 1999a. “L’hexamètre «héroïque» de Jean Antoine de Baïf”. Métrique du Moyen âge et de la Renaissance, Dominique Billy (ed.), pp. 163–184. Paris/Montréal: L’Harmattan.

Morin, Yves Charles. 1999b. “La graphie de Jean-Antoine de Baïf: au service du mètre!” L’écriture du français à la Renaissance – Orthographe, ponctuation, systèmes scripturaires. Nouvelle Revue du Seizième siècle 17/1.85–106.

Morin, Yves Charles. 2000. “La prononciation et la prosodie du français au XVIe siècle selon le témoignage de Jean-Antoine de Baïf”. Où en est la phonologie du français? Bernard Laks (ed.). Langue française 126.9–28.

Tahureau, Jacques. 1555. Oraison de Jacques Tahureau au Roy de la grandeur de son règne, & de l’excellance de la langue françoyse; plus Quelques vers du mesme autheur dediez à Madame Marguerite. Paris: veufve Maurice de La Porte.

Tahureau, Jacques. 1565. Dialogues non moins profitables que facetieus ou les vices d’un châcun sont repris fort aprement, pour nous animer davantage à les fuir et suivre la vertu. Paris: Gabriel Buon.

Tahureau, Jacques. 1568. Dialogues non moins profitables que facetieus ou les vices d’un chacun [sic] sont repris fort aprement, pour nous animer davantage à les fuir et suivre la vertu. Paris: Gabriel Buon.

Tahureau, Jacques. 1981. Les dialogues non moins profitables que facétieux, Max Gauna (ed.). Geneva: Librairie Droz.

Taillemont, Claude de. 1556. La Tricarite, plus qelqes chants an faveur de pluzieurs damoêzelles. Lyon: J. Temporal.


Taillemont, Claude de. 1989. La Tricarite, Gabriel A. Pérouse (ed.). Geneva: Droz.

7 Texts with personal spellings

The systematic study of distributional orthographical regularities may eventually throw some unexpected light on some aspects of pronunciation in any text, if it is sufficiently long, be it written in the most traditional conservative orthography. The odds, however, are against it. Firmin-Didot’s comments suggest that the three following authors may be more promising than most others. A forthcoming computer edition in Epistemon of Matthieu’s work (http://www.cesr.univ-tours.fr/Epistemon/cornucopie/Cornuc.asp) will soon allow one to put the conjecture to the test. Author date Editions and characteristics db Matthieu, Abel 1559–1572 editions: R. Breton, Paris: 1559, 1560; I. de Bordeaux, Paris:

1572. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:191. dialect: no obvious regional features, the author originates from Chartres.

Godard, Jean 1620 edition: N. Jullieron, Lyon. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:213. dialect: no obvious regional features, the author originates from Paris.

Frémont d’Ablancourt, Nicolas

1664 edition: T. Jolly, Paris. observations: cf. Firmin-Didot 1868:257. dialect: no obvious regional features, the author originates from Paris.

References Firmin-Didot, Ambroise. 1868. Observations sur l’orthographe, ou, Ortografie française;

suivies d’une Histoire de la réforme orthographique depuis le XVe siècle jusqu’à nos jours, 2nd rev. ed. Paris: Ambroise Firmin-Didot.

Frémont d’Ablancourt, Nicolas. 1664. Dialogue des lettres de l’alphabet, où l’usage et la grammaire parlent, published at the end of Traduction de Lucien by Perrot d’Ablancourt, pp. 468–493. Paris: T. Jolly.

Godard, Jean. 1620. La langue françoise. Lyon: Nicolas Jullieron. Matthieu, Abel, sieur des Moystardières. 1559. Deuis de la langue françoyse, à Jehanne

d’Albret, royne de Navarre. Paris: Richard Breton. Matthieu, Abel, sieur des Moystardières. 1560. Second Deuis et principal propos de la langue

françoyse, à la royne de Navarre. Paris: Richard Breton. Matthieu, Abel, sieur des Moystardières. 1572. Deuis de la langue françoise, fort exquis et

singulier. Auesques vn autre Deuis & propos touchant la police & les estatz, où il est contenu (oultre les sentences & histoires) vn brief extraict du grec de Dion, surnommé Bouche-dor: de la Comparaison entre la royauté & la tyrannie. Paris: Iean de Bordeaux/Veufve Richard Breton.


8 Concluding remarks

The documents marked with the sign “+” in the tables above have been entered in different databases at different periods, with largely different protocols. Each was built to solve a specific problem. Some of them have been completely lemmatized; some are little more than a raw concordance. Little effort has yet been made to use a common approach, and it appears unlikely that a uniform protocol may even be profitably considered for printed and written documents to be included in a common database. Their authors referred to a common norm for the pronunciation of French that was escaping them. Each had largely different conceptions of the organization of sounds in language and of the ways a spelling system had to incorporate sound distinctions. On the other hand they shared a common vocabulary to describe the sounds of the language that often masked their divergences and could underlie widely different realities. The experience gathered these last twenty years has shown that each document must be analyzed on its own. There does not appear much to be gained by cross-referencing the data between different authors. It appeared most profitable to examine each spelling system individually and relate it to the forms that the French, the high language of the privileged classes, had taken in the different regions where it eventually became the official language.

Acknowledgments

Most of the databases presented here have been created over a period of twenty years and benefited from several grants from the Government of Québec (FCAC, FCAR) and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). I would like to acknowledge with thanks the help of Michèle Bonin, Carole Bouchard, Catherine Courchesne, Isabelle Crevier, Jocelyne Cyr, Sophie Daoust, Danielle Fréchette, Jocelyn Guilbault, Martine Ouellet, Julie Richard and Sandra Thibault. These bases are now being maintained and expanded within the framework of the MCRI project Modeling Change: The Paths of French, directed by F. Martineau, also funded in part by the SSHRC. I would like to thank for their contribution Stéphanie Brazeau and Jaïme Dubé. The databases for the texts with deviant orthographies (section 2) have been created for the realization of a project also funded in part by the SSHRC, Évolution et variation dans le français du Québec du XVIIe au XIXe siècles, under the direction of France Martineau, with the collaboration of Alain Desrochers. We would like to acknowledge with thanks the help of Marianne Chevrier, Jennifer Dionne, Maxime Glandon, Amélie Hamel, Philippe Leblond, Ashley Lemieux and Mylène Pérault for their participation to this project.

A corpus of French texts with non-standard orthography

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